Gun.Smoke (Arcade)

Capcom's Gun.Smoke is a scrolling shoot 'em up...sans spaceship? What's going on here?

Yes, this game is set in the Wild West, and that means shootin' everyone you come across. Based on the long-running TV show, but not really. Watch out for cow skulls!

Unused Graphics#

	While there are around 50 special characters in the game's font, only 18 of them are used. The 32 other unique characters don't appear anywhere, even in the name entry screen. Notable symbols include a Hot Spring symbol and a small POW icon.
	Something particularly strange is in the text graphics ROM; an entirely unique, completely unused font! Note that this image was modified from how it's stored on the ROM; all tiles have been rotated 180°. It's unknown where this font would be used, and it doesn't match a font used in any of Capcom's games. The only clue as to what kind of game would use this font is the tank character in the 6th row.
	The name Takashi Aoki is stored in the object graphics ROM.
	A human skull with red eyes. Cow skulls appear in the game as a power-down item. This does not.
	An alternate design for the POW item. This appears in Savage Bees as a weapon power-up. It might have had a similar effect in this game.
	Despite being setting in the Wild West and all, there's a conspicuous absence of cacti. There are some in the object graphics ROM, but they never appear in-game. Odd, that.
	Graphics for an 11th boss! He wields two pistols, has a nifty hat, and looks very sleepy. Presumably he would appear in the cut 11th stage seen below.
	A boulder is found near the cut boss's graphics. Presumably the boss would hide behind it. There are two boss frames that are cut off at the torso; those could only be used if he was behind something.
	Three other boulder sprites can be found in the object graphics. The boulders in the game are background graphics. Perhaps they were planning to hide stuff behind them.
	A cut short enemy with frames for walking, jumping, taking multiple hits and throwing bombs. While the final game does feature enemies that throw explosives, they throw dynamite, not black bombs.
	This is the bomb he was supposed to throw. The frames suggest that the bomb was meant to work more or less the same way as the dynamite.
	A cut bald enemy with an eyepatch (Sagat??) with the ability to throw dynamite, looking quite similar to the used bomber enemy. He's stored right next to Pig Joe, the stage 5 boss, possibly suggesting he was meant to accompany him in his boss battle.
	Another cut smaller enemy, containing only frames for jumping and throwing knives while in the air. He bears a strong resemblance to Fat Man, the stage 9 boss, and he's stored right next to him, so he was probably meant to help him in battle.
	Here's the knife he'd throw. It's different from the ones thrown by Roy.
	A larger bullet type stored near the Wingate Family. All of the family members shoot the basic round bullet type during the fight.
	Animations of the gunman enemy and his Native incarnation being killed and falling into water. The background collision prevents them from getting anywhere near the water, so they never get the chance to be killed there.
	A Native version of the bomber enemy, intended to appear in stage 6. The regular one is used instead.
	The Native version of the gunman enemy has frames for performing every action of his original incarnation, including falling from a height, which has no use in Round 6.
	Pig Joe has frames for walking He's got no time for that when he's constantly jumping around and throwing dynamite.
	A different design of the bull with a different color palette. It's located near the end of the tileset along with other Native versions of the enemies, meaning it was supposedly meant to replace the regular bulls in stage 6. However, said stage doesn't feature any bulls.
	Wolf Chief jumping off his dead horse. His horse can't be killed during the ambush segments where he's spectating, and he fights without it at the end of the stage.

Early	Final

In the tileset of the German version of the game, there exist copies of the power-up graphics near the unused POW item.
These tiles are completely blank in all other versions.
While almost all of the power-ups look identical to the original counterparts, the boots that increase movement speed uses a different, less detailed design.

Stage Select#

A rudimentary stage select is in the game. Set the Slot A / Slot B credit settings to the appropriate value, then turn the Service Mode switch on when the copyright warning screen appears.

Unused Map#

Due to its large vertical size, the image of the stage has been hidden by default. Click to reveal:

An unused area is stored in the game's tile map starting at offset 5D40 and ending at 6938. This is probably where the cut boss would be fought.

This map can be seen in the game by modifying the RAM address E04F and set the value to 5F. This address controls the checkpoint position and requires to purposely lose a life to make it work.

However there seems to be no Background Collision implemented in this map whatsoever.

Otherwise, this is a fairly unremarkable level using the river archetype. The only structures of note are the two parallel bridges near the end of the stage.

Given how the tilemap mostly matches the order of the stages in the game, it can be assumed this map was meant to be Round 6, which is Wolf Chief's stage in the final game. Wolf Chief's stage is the only one whose tilemap is stored out of order, being the last one, so it's safe to assume it replaced this cut stage.

Unused Music#

Two tracks are unused.

Serial String#

A hidden string can be found at 7E50 in each version. These strings also give an early title for the game.

85113    Gunman   J
    == GSJ_03 ==

85113    Gunman   N
    == GSE_03 ==

85113    Gunman   A
    == GSR_03 ==

85113    Gunman   A
    == GSA_03 ==

Firefly Secret#

Insert 16 credits and start the game. A Firefly worth 10,000 points will fly by near the start of the stage.

Regional Differences#

Japan	World	North America

In a standard mid-80s Capcom game change, the number of letters per name was reduced from 8 to 3. The Romstar releases further alter the first two names from the World version's high score table.

German Version#

Just like Commando, the version of the game released in Germany had major graphical changes in order to abide by Germany's strict laws about killing people in media. Their solution to get around this? Making everyone a cyborgǃ It's one of those cases of censorship that absolutely has to be seen to be believed.

International	West Germany

Most of the enemies (including unused ones) were given flashing eyes.

International	West Germany

The boss portraits received easily the most notable makeover. And what a makeover it isǃ

Even the unused boss' portrait was roboticizedǃ

Some of the bosses' in-game sprites were altered to match these design changes.

International	West Germany

Ninja has his face covered in black with an eye blinking when he's throwing shurikens darts.

What appears to be a small leftover of his original face is visible on the standing frames of the German sprite.

International	West Germany

Cutter received a metal bar attached to his head.

International	West Germany

Fat Man received a mechanical mouth and three eyes flashing red.

International	West Germany

The Wingate Sons had a minor change to their eyes. Note that, while they both received a different kind of cyborg eye in the German portraits, they both use the same sprite in-game, with this one seemingly based on the left portrait.

International	West Germany

Wingate Father has a mechanical mouth. His crawling sprites were left intact, though.

Aside from these changes, a few other sprites were redrawn.

Pig Joe's jumping frame has been changed to not having mouth open, which results him spitting fireballs with his mouth closed.

Also, one of his defeated frames had his arms edited to be symmetrical.

International	West Germany

Wolf Chief no longer holds his shotgun in his damaged frame.

International	West Germany

The spear throwing Native enemy is actually shown holding a spear nowǃ His right arm was made a bit thicker too.

Revisional Differences#

North American revision#

There are two revisions of the North American game. The following changes were made to Set 2:

• The copyright year was changed from 1985 to 1986.
• The boss demonstration dipswitch was changed. It now controls the number of starting lives, and the demonstration never plays. If the dipswitch isn't flipped, the player will start with 5 lives instead of 3.
• The default high score was changed from 100000 to 110000.
• Stages 3 and 6 were swapped, making early progress in the game much more difficult.

Capcom Arcade 2nd Stadium#

This page or section needs more images. There's a whole lotta words here, but not enough pictures. Please fix this. Specifically: Get the rip of this version title screen for comparison.

The game's title was changed to Gan Sumoku, with a brand new katakana logo in all regions, likely due to potential legal issues with the name Gun.Smoke.

References#